Let The Tanks Roll! Achtung Panzer: Kharkov 1943 Review

From Paradox Interactive comes Achtung Panzer : Kharkov1943, take control of a soviet commander in the defense of the German Panzer forces, with all their resources available, use strategy and cunning to prevail. Can YOU protect Kharkov?

1943, two years before Hitler threw in the towel, WWII still raging, the Werhmacht are attempting to capture Kharkov, with operation “Hawk”, The SS Division Totenkopf have been sent forward to destroy soviet tanks, but the red army had none of it and held strong! Unfortunately the Germans didn’t give up and renewed their tank forces with operation “panther”  and Soviets are now severely outnumbered…take control of a soviet commander and crush this newly reinforced army! Use tactics and the arsenal of WWII soviets, and help protect Kharkov!

As soon as you load the game you are thrown straight into the action, chose between several missions and get started, if you are not so RTS inclined like myself, there is an option in the options menu to display the Tutorial, which explains every little button and item on the HUD in game.

After selecting the mission to play, you get a tactics screen, where you can upgrade, replenish ammunition, repairs vehicles or swap a squad with wounded or depleted squads in the battle field, in this screen you need to chose where to position you squads, and best control key points in Kharkov without being overrun by the enemy forces, you then complete your turn like a game of chess and wait for the enemy to make their moves.

When you come under attack you then move to another screen where you see the fighting in an attempt to keep control of the key point you’re currently holding, objective there is to not let the enemy take control of the key points and wipe them out! The only drawback I found on this, it’s a nicely thought out bit of the game and really the main part of it, but I find the camera a bit glitchy and goes all over the place when I’m trying to keep an eye on combat or even trying to get my men to attack a certain target, the lack of camera control really killed the game for me, since I was really looking forward to the combat part. But apart from the dodgy camera it is still good fun.

All in all I give this game a 7/10 purely for the lack of control of the camera, but with that aside it is a really cool game and I did enjoy it, as a massive fan of any WWII game, I did really like the fact it was taking a lesser known side to it unlike most other games that use the bigger “turning points” makes a nice change of pace, while staying truthful on real life with the weapons, vehicles and tactics used in WWII. Well done to everyone at Paradox, now let’s see if we can get that camera fixed!

Review by: Jamie Gillett.